


lean on me (bittersweet)

by SolaSola



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Campaign 03 Season 02: The Unsleeping City Chapter II, Cooking, Domestic Fluff, Episode Tag, Episode: c03s02e11: Let's Get Tiny, F/M, Gen, Light Angst, Missing Scene, POV Alternating, Photo Shoots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-23
Updated: 2021-01-23
Packaged: 2021-03-15 02:36:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28931121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SolaSola/pseuds/SolaSola
Summary: “Esther! You’re back!” Ricky calls from where he’s shirtless and lounging in front of a whole professional backdrop they’ve gotten from somewhere.“Hi, sweetheart,” Esther calls back. She thinks she does a good job acting casual and not like she’s trying her hardest not to swoon or possibly kick everyone else out of the apartment so she can just spend time with her boyfriend like this. What is happening? “You guys need some help?”[ricky offers up a calendar. from esther and pete and ricky's points of view]
Relationships: Ricky Matsui & Pete Conlan, Ricky Matsui/Esther Sinclair
Comments: 18
Kudos: 55





	lean on me (bittersweet)

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't quite hurt/comfort but it's a weird amount of angst?
> 
> Written post-ep11 even though this scene might still happen in canon after the ep12 fight.

Esther comes home from the Society windblown and stops in her tracks in the doorway. The apartment’s not a mess, per se, but it’s just—a lot. There’re about six pairs of shoes all strewn around by the entryway and a bunch of furniture and potted plants shoved into the middle of the room so that all the natural light coming in from the big clock tower windows is more accessible. And a whole clump of people clustered around her boyfriend in front of said windows.

“Esther! You’re back!” Ricky calls from where he’s shirtless and lounging in front of a whole professional backdrop they’ve gotten from somewhere. 

“Hi, sweetheart,” Esther calls back. She thinks she does a good job acting casual and not like she’s trying her hardest not to swoon or possibly kick everyone else out of the apartment so she can just spend time with her boyfriend like this. What is _happening_? “You guys need some help?”

Sofia says they’ve got it handled so Esther can take her time getting her boots off and her book bag put away before she goes over to talk to everyone and see what’s going on.

She carefully puts herself in front of her desk just to keep away anyone who maybe was planning on borrowing her desktop to quickly search for something and chancing on the Dropbox folder of Ricky selfies and also the word document full of ideas for the “A Year of March” calendar Esther’s maybe been thinking about for a little bit. They’re both right on her desktop for easy access—Esther reminds herself she should maybe change that. This is a better calendar though. For a good cause. 

Pete stands a little awkwardly in one corner of Ricky and Esther’s really nice Chantry Hill apartment and fills their kettle with water, mostly just to be doing something. There’s a lot of activity happening out in the main room—Kingston’s frowning at some kind of spreadsheet, Cody is cursing as he tries to assemble a softbox light that Esther pulled out of storage somewhere, Iga is flicking through photos she took on her phone the other day of Ricky absolutely covered in pigeons (and shirtless, and hot, of course), and Sofia is fussing with Ricky’s hair even though it’s short and spiky and absolutely refusing to be moved.

They’re all here in the apartment on short notice and it’s a lot of commotion. Pete’s no stranger to that, but he is a stranger to Ricky and Esther’s perfect domestic life here in their apartment and also all his friends leaping into action here to fundraise for, of all things, Pete trying to claw himself out of this hole after dumping thousands of dollars of cocaine in a toilet in Nod.

Ricky and Esther’s potted plants are really nice, Pete thinks incongruously. They’ve got, like, monstera and shit. 

All of this means a fucking lot to him and Pete’s kind of overwhelmed, which is why he’s in the kitchen taking a break from helping Sofia advise Ricky on posing. 

When the kettle starts whistling at him it’s not even that loud compared to the hubbub in the rest of the apartment. Pete pours a mug and tries to look for where Ricky and Esther keep their magical tea.

As much as he tries Pete can’t shake the irrational feeling that he’s swooped in here and dumped his problems on his friends and messed up Ricky and Esther’s perfect apartment and perfect lives. At heart he knows it’s not like that, but he wishes he didn’t need this so badly.

Pete thinks he’s crying, tears sliding quietly off his cheeks. He tries to focus on the warm mug of just hot water in his hands and the countertop he’s leaning on and his friends in a focused kind of chaos across the room. It just. It means a whole fucking lot. 

This isn’t Ricky’s life anymore, the softbox and Sofia flitting around messing with his hair and being shirtless in front of a camera all afternoon. Ricky’s life now is this fucking awesome apartment and his workout gear pushed into the middle of the room next to Esther’s potted plants and tea stocked in the cupboards next to a single bottle of barbeque sauce. Pete feels stomach-clenchingly guilty about it but also Ricky’s just such a good dude and he’ll never be able to make this up to him. 

He’s just such a good dude, Pete thinks, and he scrubs his sleeve over his eyes. They’re happy tears, he thinks. They’re just-a-lot tears. He fidgets with his phone and checks on where the trip to Lugash’s office with Sofia tomorrow is entered into his calendar. Pete’s still crying but he doesn’t know if he minds. He goes to get the teabags and gives himself extra sugar to balance out the salt plinking into his mug. 

Ricky checks on the chicken in the oven as he and Esther putter around their kitchen making dinner that night. He feels a little inexplicably cold and goes over to a chair to pull on a hoodie over his t-shirt. Not that he’s unfamiliar with going shirtless maybe more than your average person, but it’s cold in the loft in December and he’s been a little chilly all afternoon.

Esther notices him fidgeting and comes up behind him, looping her arms around him and hooking her chin over his shoulder. She’s in a big lumpy sweater, soft and warm.

“You doing okay?” Esther asks gently, and Ricky thinks about it. It was weird to be Mr. March again for a photoshoot today, weird to hear Sofia slip into more of her Staten Island accent as she tapped a pen against her planner and checked off a list of women she’s calling about going blonde. Hearing “Mr. March” in that accent more often than he hears his actual name. Matsui doesn’t even really sound that much like March, Ricky thinks.

It’s for Pete, though.

Ricky doesn’t know if he’s ever seen Pete so upset as when he was figuring out what he’d have to do. He’s not the most observant guy, but Pete wasn’t doing a great job of hiding when he took a break from all the calendar prep to make some tea for everyone. And took the tissue box from the living room with him into the kitchen.

He shrugs his shoulders a little bit in his FDNY sweatshirt and leans his head into Esther’s. “Big mess in the apartment today,” he says, and Esther doesn’t push too much farther. 

“It’s really nice of you to do this to help Pete out, sweetie,” Esther says, warm and next to his ear where she’s wrapped around his back. She doesn’t move her arms from where she’s holding him but points her chin a little bit at the broccoli they’ve got stir-frying on the stove, and Ricky remembers to stir it a little bit.

“Being Mr. March again for a bit, huh?” Ricky says.

“You’re always a very fine Mr. March, honey,” Esther says, and she pats his broad shoulder comfortingly. “But I’m just as proud of Mr. Matsui for doing this.”

Ricky’s warm in his sweatshirt, and he leans his head gently into Esther’s as he finishes up their dinner.

It’s worth it, he thinks. It’s gotta be worth it. 

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Orla Gartland's "Between My Teeth" about the pressure to help save your friends. It's a Ricky song. 
> 
> I pspsps at episode 12 coming out next week and dare it to joss this so sweetly, I simply think that a photoshoot in Esther and Ricky's apartment would be really fun to see in canon, you want to joss this so bad—
> 
> Kudos and comments are even better than a Spaghetti's cannoli, and I reply to every one!
> 
> This fic is rebloggable [here](https://mordredmanor.tumblr.com/post/641084797311205376/lean-on-me-bittersweet-solasola-dimension-20) on my tumblr [@mordredmanor](https://mordredmanor.tumblr.com/).


End file.
